2 Samuel 21.
“THEN”, at the beginning of the chapter should be omitted; it is a translator’s error. We are not told when the famine occurred it was “in the days of David”, —something that happened while he was king of Israel. He rightly turns to God to learn the cause of the prolonged drought.
The living God was in the circumstance; is He not in everything that, concerns His children? and should they not bring all their perplexities, their trials, indeed, all their circumstances to Him in prayer? Never a trial, never a burden, without a cause, and the Christian should be “exercised thereby” (see Hebrews 12:1111Now no chastening for the present seemeth to be joyous, but grievous: nevertheless afterward it yieldeth the peaceable fruit of righteousness unto them which are exercised thereby. (Hebrews 12:11) and context).
The cause of the famine was in the government of God. David might forget the wrong done by Saul to the Gibeonites, (those descendants of the men of the 9th chapter of Joshua), but not so God. The people of Israel had promised to preserve the Gibeonites. Saul had, at sometime not recorded, killed some of them in zeal for the people, but not for God. This sinful act had not been judged, and David now inquired of the poor Gibeonites what they wished. He failed in not asking direction of God as to carrying out their demand; had he done so, some happier way might have been found of compensating for the wrong done them. However, the result is that the whole house of Saul is brought to an end, except Mephibosheth, (the one who, though an enemy by nature, was willing to receive from David, and found in him his happy portion, was true to him in his absence, now escaped the judgment which overtook others no worse than himself. This is the character of the grace of God to the lost).
Rizpah guarded her sons’ bodies day and night from beasts and birds for perhaps six months, and when David heard of her devotion, he was moved to have the bones of Saul and Jonathan and the seven young men who had been hanged by the Gibeonites, given an honorable burial in the family sepulcher. Then the famine ceased.
It was not a new thing to have trouble with the Philistines, but David had killed the fearful Goliath when the people were afraid. David was now in power, and with his people who loved and trusted him, lesser victories were obtained over Philistine giants by Abishai, Sibbechai, Elhanan, and Jonathan. It is always harder to subdue the enemy within (as the Philistines), than outside of one’s self.
ML 03/20/1927